AsianCrit and Autoethnography: A Future-Focussed Fugue of Critical Collaborative Inquiry

Abstract

Despite the considerable influence of the “Asian Century” on Australian Government policy and the purported centrality of Asia to Australian national identity, the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic has simultaneously highlighted and intensified the deleterious impacts of anti-Asian racism. Specifically, Orientalist discourses and a “fear of invasion” that underpin the differential racialized treatment of the Asian diaspora in Australia have manifested in both old and new racisms that have had significant impacts on the mental and physical wellbeing of Asian Australians. In response to this crisis, this autoethnographic paper acknowledges the growing methodological complexity of Critical Race Theory and advances a novel, future-focussed Asian Australian social justice agenda in solidarity with other racialized minorities by interrogating the collaborative potential of Asian Critical Race Theory (AsianCrit) and Autoethnography through an investigation of their respective theoretical and methodological intersections.

Interrogating (Proximity to) Whiteness: Asian(American) Women in Autoethnographic Sister Circles

“…Through Autoethnographic Sister Circles, we discovered new ways of conducting and (re)presenting autoethnographic research that we would not normally have through conducting autoethnography alone. Our embodiment of Autoethnographic Sister Circles is one of the many ways Women of Color can engage in autoethnographic storytelling, but it certainly is not the only way of conducting (collective) autoethnographic research (see other examples of autoethnographic research: Batac, 2022; Ellis et al, 2018; Hanauer, 2012; Meacham et al, 2022; Qiu et al, in press; Teo, 2022). Therefore, we invite fellow Women of Color sister-scholars to be in community and conversation with us, both methodologically and through personal narratives, using storytelling methods/methodologies that are authentic to them through various modal, cultural, linguistic, and land/location/time-specific traditions.…”

Dissecting Anti‐Asian Racism Through a Historical and Transnational AsianCrit Lens

“…AsianCrit scholars have pursued groundbreaking research in multiple fields of education, such as social studies and history curriculum (An, 2017), secondary education (Chae, 2013), teacher education (Hsieh and Nguyen, 2021; Kim, 2022; Kim‐Bossard, 2022), language education (Sun, 2020), immigrant and refugee identities (Kim‐Bossard, 2022; Kolano, 2016; Qin et al., 2022), international students in higher education institutions (Saito and Li, 2022; Yao et al., 2019), and autoethnographic reflections (Kim‐Bossard, 2022; Kolano, 2016; Teo, 2022). However, no research to date has been done to systematically analyze anti‐Asian racism through the lens of AsianCrit and transnationalism.…”

“…However, no research to date has been done to systematically analyze anti‐Asian racism through the lens of AsianCrit and transnationalism. Although researchers have started to focus on contexts outside the United States (e.g., Australia by Teo, 2022), most of the research has focused on Asian American and immigrant populations in the United States. We argue that AsianCrit as a framework to understand Asian experiences in the context of hegemonic whiteness can work beyond the context of the United States and can be a powerful tool to counter the “transcultural phenomenon” (Luo, Yang, and Li, 2022 [special issue call]) of anti‐Asian racism.…”

Autoethnographically Interrogating School-Based Anti-“Asian” Racism in Post(?)-Pandemic Times: An AsianCrit-Informed Composite Palimpsest

“…2. Convergences that were simultaneously illuminated and amplified during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a growing repository of (counter)stories from a range of North American stakeholders in the higher education teaching (Endo, 2021a(Endo, , 2021b and learning space (Dai & Arnberg, 2022;Hau Lam et al, 2022), as well as the Australian context in schools (Teo, 2023a(Teo, , 2023b and broader societal settings (Asian Australian Alliance et al, 2020;Monzon & Bapuji, 2020).…”

“… 2. Convergences that were simultaneously illuminated and amplified during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a growing repository of (counter)stories from a range of North American stakeholders in the higher education teaching (Endo, 2021a, 2021b) and learning space (Dai & Arnberg, 2022; Hau Lam et al, 2022), as well as the Australian context in schools (Teo, 2023a, 2023b) and broader societal settings (Asian Australian Alliance et al, 2020; Monzon & Bapuji, 2020). Consequently, this paper seeks to extend the transnational conversation on Anti-“Asian” racism by chronicling “Asian” Australian teachers’ personal and professional race-making practices in the face of racism before and during COVID-19. …”